compressive-vasomotion
The Compressive Vasomotion Hypothesis (CVH) (Johnson 2023): the vasomotion reflex — the undulation of VSMCs wrapping every blood vessel — functions as a compression sweep on nearby neural resonances, collapsing and merging fragile, ambivalent patterns (the "Bayesian blur") into a more durable, definite state. This is the +1 / generate leg of the vasocomputation timescale triad: the fast initial "grab" that creates specificity.
Use When
- Modeling the ~25–100 ms taṇhā "fast grabby thing" as a physical compression event
- Reframing precision-weighting as two terms: sensory clarity available vs. compression forcefulness applied (the KL divergence between them ≈ a number for taṇhā)
- Representing the generative collapse step where a superposition of interpretations is jostled into one
- Coupling local electromagnetic-field dissonance → vasomotion trigger → resonance collapse
Core Concepts
- Compression sweep: motifs of vasomotion, reflexive reactions to uncertainty, and patterns of taṇhā are equivalent. The brain pushes "what is" toward stable, satisfactory, controllable — the three marks inverted.
- Bayesian blur: an ambivalent SOHM superposition that has not yet committed; CVH collapses it (cf. collapsing a probability distribution / pinching a critical network into a definite circuit).
- Trigger: VSMC contractions are expected to be triggered by local dissonance in the electromagnetic field and to act back on neurons via ephaptic coupling, reduced blood flow, and altered local resonance.
- Right amount ≠ zero: a finite brain must compress away patterns or drown in sensory chaos; the cost is metabolic + epistemic. CVH is unskillful only when over-applied.
GF(3) Balanced Triad
compressive-vasomotion (+1) ⊗ vascular-clamp (0) ⊗ latched-hyperprior (−1) = 0 (mod 3)
Skill Trit: +1 (Play / generate — the sweep produces a candidate collapse; cf. match-fires in the PAM RETE).
Concomitant Skills
| Skill | Trit | Interface |
|-------|------|-----------|
| vascular-clamp | 0 | downstream: freezes what the sweep collapsed |
| latched-hyperprior | −1 | downstream: cements a sustained collapse |
| vasocomputation | +1 | umbrella / vascular substrate |
| kolmogorov-compression | +1 | compression progress as a drive (Schmidhuber) |
| fokker-planck-analyzer | +1 | stationary collapse of a resonance landscape |
| information-geometry | 0 | precision-weighting / KL of clarity vs. grab |
Current literature (2024–2026)
- van Veluw et al. (2020), Neuron — spontaneous ~0.1 Hz vasomotion drives paravascular clearance; amplitude is tunable.
- Hauglund / Nedergaard et al. (2025), Cell — locus-coeruleus NE infraslow oscillations drive slow vasomotion → glymphatic clearance in NREM; zolpidem suppresses it.
- Kedarasetti & Drew (2024), Neuron — vasomotion travels as long-wavelength waves; resting modulation exceeds evoked. Recasts the "compression sweep" as a literal traveling wave, not a global clock.
- Atasoy et al. (2016), Nat Commun — connectome harmonics; with Safron's SOHMs gives the "out-of-tune harmonic → contraction" claim a formal substrate.
- Pinotsis & Miller (2023), Prog Neurobiol — cytoelectric coupling: endogenous fields sculpt activity (grounds the ephaptic loop; VSMC→field causation still unestablished).
- Sharpening: specify which ~0.1 Hz band (myogenic vs LC/NE vs Mayer) drives compression — the 2025 literature warns these are conflated.
- Hook: vasomotion phase should predict bistable-percept switching; optogenetic VSMC constriction should narrow local neural dynamic range / lower LFP entropy.
- Grounded: vasomotion exists + glymphatic role + ephaptic fields. Speculative: vasomotion as a Bayesian-collapse mechanism.
References
- Johnson, M.E. (2023). Principles of Vasocomputation, Part I. opentheory.net (§V, CVH).
- Schmidhuber, J. (2008). Driven by Compression Progress. arXiv.
- Safron, A. (2020). IWMT. Frontiers in AI 3. (SOHMs as autoencoders/symmetry detectors.)
- Carhart-Harris & Friston (2019). REBUS and the Anarchic Brain. Pharmacol. Rev. 71(3).